NBC Sports Reveals On-Demand Capabilities for NBC Sports Live Extra and Premier League Extra Time

For the 2013-14 season of the Premier League on NBC Sports, every single match will be made available live on television and the Internet via a combination of NBC Sports Network (NBCSN), NBC, Premier League Extra Time, NBC Sports Live Extra app and other NBC networks. However, not every single match will be available on demand for the beginning of the season.

According to a NBC Sports spokesperson:

“There will be select games on demand (via Premier League Extra Time TV package and NBC Sports Live Extra streaming product) each week. This weekend to start, we’ll have two games and we’ll likely add games each week as the season progresses. The games will be available beginning later that afternoon and will be archived until the following Saturday.”

NBC Sports didn’t disclose the reason for the phased approach in regards to starting with two games available on-demand the first week followed by the possibility of adding more each week as the season unfolds.

It’s possible that NBC Sports may want to roll out the on-demand offerings in a phased approach to ensure that both NBC Sports Live Extra and Premier League Extra Time can handle the huge demand from soccer fans in the United States. As Jonathan Tannenwald of Philly.com points out, NBC Sports Live Extra specializes in live streaming and doesn’t currently offer on-demand matches for Major League Soccer or the National Hockey League.

What does this mean for soccer fans in the United States? If you have access to Premier League Extra Time, get your DVR ready to record the matches you want to watch later. For soccer fans with access to NBC Sports Live Extra, watch the live Premier League matches that are most important to you. As a safety net, NBC Sports will also have their Match Of The Day program for recaps of all games.

While everyone will agree that we would have loved to have 100% on-demand access beginning with the opening weekend via Premier League Extra Time and NBC Sports Live Extra, that isn’t the case. We still have every match available to us live. In the first few weeks of the season, it means that we’ll need to prioritize what games we want to watch live, get our DVRs ready and then think about a strategy of how best we want to consume the Premier League games. Over time, NBC Sports will increase the on-demand capabilities where we won’t have to think too much about what we want to watch when we want to watch it.

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About The Author

Publisher of World Soccer Talk, Christopher Harris founded the site in 2005. He has been interviewed by The New York Times, The Guardian and several other publications. Plus he has made appearances on NPR, BBC World, CBC, BBC Five Live, talkSPORT and beIN SPORT.
Harris, who was born and raised in Wales, has lived in Florida since 1984, and supported Swansea City since 1979. Last but not least, he got engaged during half-time of a MLS game.

69 Comments

JydeAugust 15, 2013

NBC Sports are on a roll…they seem to be ahead of the game…this is another fantastic news…*chanting* Ole Ole Ole Ole!!!!!! 🙂

We also have to remember that they will be having programs like Match of the Day and Goal Zone, while hopefully will complement their entire coverage. We’ve been spoiled a bit (though at a cost), but hopefully we’ll be even more spoiled come the end of this season.

I’ve been more than impressed with NBCSN’s promotion of the Premier League so far. The couple of original shows they’ve had have been great, and I’m excited to see what they churn out in the next few weeks.

On-demand is not a major issue for most people? Wrong. I live on the West Coast. There’s simply no way we’re getting up at 4 or 5 am to watch a live natch. With two kids in the house, and tons of activities to do on the weekend, we basically don’t watch ANYTHING live. Monday matches are during our work day, so again… for us, broadcasting every game live is not useful for us. We ONLY need On-Demand, Online streaming, and we certainly don’t want to go to the website to select a video and see a ticker of all the final scores staring us in the face (which is what NBC Live Extra has). It’s beyond me why they did not adequately consult Fox Soccer or ESPN3 before they set up their online system. Those guys (FSC, ESPN3) understand US soccer fans. If you think the online streaming viewership is minor for soccer in the US, you’re gravely mistaken.

This guy is totally right. Many soccer fans work the games into our schedule because soccer fans tend to be college-educated people with complex mobile professions who need on-demand. I will spend hundreds to get it! what idiots, nbc!

They probably don’t want to overload their system at the beginning- as they get a feel for how much the on-demand gets used, they can add capacity. It’s a smart move- better to have a few complaints that not all the games are on-demand at first than have more complaints of people not being able to access anything at all because of system overload..

And it’s better because it’s complimentary. NBC isn’t asking me to pay additional cash for games that I can see on TV (and not just on a channel that costs an additional $15). Not that anyone would exercise such an absurd viewing option or something…

It’s a legitimate complaint. For all the happy happy kowtowing at the feet of NBC, they are dropping the ball here. I want a la carte on demand. Not an astronomical demand. I’ll gladly pay for that, like I did FoxSoccer2Go.

It is totally a legitamate complaint. IF you live on the west coast the live games will be on at 6 in the morning ! It would be nice also if they didn’t have the results plastered all over their site before you get a chance to watch the game !

i’m with you Foxy_Woxy. I would much rather pay the money to watch the mathes on demand, like i also did FoxSoccer2Go. If NBC was serious about covering the EPL for the true fans, they would have have their on demand feature ready to go before the beginning of the season. very disappointing!

My guess is that it’d be the Monday match between Manchester City and Newcastle United, for everyone who won’t be able to watch the game live while they’re at work. And the Swansea-Manchester United match.

Please NEVER Say ManU.
Manchester United, man United or United.After the 1958 Munich crash that killed most of the team, other supporters from other clubs made songs making fun of the deaths with a chorus of man U.. so ever since we don;t EVER say that.

Great news for those who have the access. For myself, considering how long I had to wait to get FS in HD and FS+ at all, I am not going to sweat the small stuff right now. TWC will come around on Extra Time, if nothing else, and that will be fine with me. They’re just a frustrating bunch of…..(fill in the noun).

NBC has already hit a home run 😉 in my book. I’m sure we’ll find something to complain about once everything gets underway, but I’m just going to sit back and enjoy every match that I can get on NBCSN over the weekend, Monday and Wednesday. and give all the studio shows a good look.

Not so ‘absolutely’ after all it seems.
NBC, why not have a premium version of the service that adds full access to all games for 2 weeks after they air, for a reasonable fee like $5 a month. That will remove a lot of the worry about too many people accessing and give you extra revenue and you are still offering what you promised, every game for free, while catering to those who have to work around different schedules or family demands or whatever.

For someone that works during the matches, or does not get the overflow channels, or lives in time-zone where the matches start at 5am, why would a premium service not be a good option?

Not everyone has just one favorite team that they want to watch. Being a “nuetral”, I like to watch all of the games. Thankfully, I have the overflow channels starting on the 24th of August (Cox) – but if I fell into the above categories I would love the option of a pay premium to get to watch the matches at my leisure. When the time was right for me. When I *had* the time to watch them.

One thing I loved about the foxsoccer.com website is they had 2-3 minute highlights of all EPL games available about a day after they aired. Any word on whether NBCSports.com or the NBC Sports Live Extra app will have highlight videos too?

The best thing for me with the NBC deal will be the wrap around programming and review shows of high quality that surround the matches both pre/ post and during the week. Hopefully there will be little need to search the net for those services now that we have our own Match of the Day.

I want to take this occasion to thank Chris, Kartik and the rest of the EPL/WS Talk crew for helping make this day possible. EPL talk was around before the wave of interest in the EPL took place. It helped create the wave which lead to improvements in the FSC braodcasts, the ESPN deal and now to the wall to wall coverage by NBC. Many here remember the days that game time called for fans to go to EPL Talk to get the live reports on the games and to be able to chat with fans around the world during a match.

EPL/World Soccer Talk does indeed deserve a lot of credit for helping build momentum for and keeping us all informed of the NBC EPL coverage.

I’m certainly looking forward to the weekend and hope we will all look for positive ways to comment on the coverage. Sure it won’t be perfect, but it looks as if it will be as good as anything we have ever seen.

You guys make me laugh, people on this sight complain about tickors. If NBC was going to show games from earlier throughout the afternoon or online, I can understand, but they are not. At the start, they are not going to show any matches after live coverage ends and they are going to show two games online. Fox showed archives of every game, every game whenever I wanted, all 90 minutes. If you aren’t going to let me see every minute of every match on my schedule, give me the tickor. It doesn’t make sense to try to stay away from a result of a game that you’re never going to see.

You can read my comments from back in April. The reality is that the NBC plan will be better for some of us, worse for others when compared to Fox. They definitely seem to be going about it in a very positive fashion and with lots of passion. They are using English announcers for all matches, which is huge, compared to the Gus disaster we are still facing with Champions League, and (gulp) the World Cup.

And if you support Man Utd, Man City, Arsenal, or Chelsea, the NBC approach is *clearly* better than Fox’s, as just about every one of those games will appear on NBCSN or NBC, *and* for the first time most of those matches will also be available *live* (not waiting til 11:59 pm!) on the ‘net or your tablet live.

The downside is for West Ham supporters like me, Swansea supporters like the Gaffer, Stoke, Cardiff, Villa, Hull, etc. as many of our matches will be on the overflow channels or only available live on the internet. The overflow channels may be in Standard Def rather than in High Def depending on your provider and where you live and that will be an utter disaster after Fox showed every match in High Def every single week last year. And if you have to coach your child’s soccer match at 10 am on a Saturday morning or are otherwise out and about, there will likely be no on-demand service unless you create it yourself via the DVR. And essentially no one has the ability to record 5 or 6 10 am matches if, say, you are on Time Warner here in NYC, and your only way of watching is via Extra Time because they don’t want to make Live Extra available.

So I’m looking forward to this weekend’s coverage, hopeful that at some point Time Warner will actually let me know what channel I can watch West Ham open its season against Cardiff, but feeling I’ve probably taken a step back when compared to last year where Fox showed 38 of 38 West Ham matches in High Def on TV on a channel that I could find.

Yup as a Man United and Stoke Supporter I expect I will be able to see most of the former games and few of the latter unless our area gets Premier League Extra time on demand from Xfinity. It says select areas …. so who knows. I want to see as many games from my two teams as possible.

Ref your cmt about DISH not showing both, but only Live Extra as of last week. Just spent most of the afternoon with them on the phone and have yet to learn their designated channels for Live Extra. In fact, one DISH person said they would not be carrying EITHER ONE! Not sure that was fact, but one never knows. Anyone else with DISH have any info?

You mean Premier League Extra Time? That is an overflow TV channel(s) that only some TV providers are carrying.

NBC Sports Live Extra is an online offering for computers, laptops, phones and tablets via an app. This is available for free, provided you get NBC Sports Network, and you log on using your username and password from your TV provider.

As a long standing ex-pat Southampton fan then the NBC deal is the stuff of dreams. Every game LIVE on TV. You just can’t beat that!

If you are a fan of Man Utd, Liverpool etc then you won’t notice much difference as every game was live anyway on Fox. For those of us who support so-called smaller teams most of games were on delay. Not any more!

Guy
the Northwest of the country with Comcast are still in the wilderness.i called today and talked to two people one said it was PPV and the other directed me to FSC. to say the least they don’t know their A$$ from a hole in the ground.

I absolutely HATE that I can no longer watch just about any game on demand as on fox soccer. NBC has done a TERRIBLE job so far making things accessible to fans. Lets be honest it’s only those who know what it could have been like that are complaining. I have things to do and as a football fan in the Midwest getting up at 6:45 to hopefully catch a live game and hope the iPad app doesn’t crash has been a headache. They seriously cant figure out how to do it?! watching online, ondemand is so 2004! PLUS there is no where to complain on the NBC sports website. Hate to admit it but I wish I could still pay for foxsoccer.

I have to say – it’s nigh on impossible to share the delight at how great it is that NBC now have the rights to the Premier League. Frankly – if you’re a TWC customer (or a customer of many other providers) you’re screwed. In Los Angeles we have no Premier League Extra Time, and no Sports Live Extra. Frankly – I couldn’t care less who the commentary team are, what the pre match build up is, or any of that crap. Not being able to see most of the games live is kind of an important factor in me judging how great it is for NBC to have these rights.

Frankly – for a lot of people these developments are a disaster. Last year I could watch every game between ESPN, espn3, fox soccer and fox soccer to go. Now I can only watch a fraction of them, and only on tv, and no repeats. I – like I’m sure a lot of other fans – are locked in to a cable deal because I live in an apartment building. The only way I can switch provider is to move house!

In that context – who cares if it’s Warren Barton and Wynalda doing commentary? Or if Match of the Day has Gary Lineker on it. Like that’s going to make up for the fact that right now – millions of us cannot watch the games?